A&M center wants to help companies develop self-driving cars

By Craig Hlavaty |
February 19, 2014

The commercialization of robotics raises legal questions about such technological advances as digital body parts or driverless vehicles like this Google self-driving car.

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A bicyclist rides by a Google self-driving car at the Google headquarters on September 25, 2012 in Mountain View, California. California Gov. Jerry Brown signed State Senate Bill 1298 that allows driverless cars to operate on public roads for testing purposes. The bill also calls for the Department of Motor Vehicles to adopt regulations that govern licensing, bonding, testing and operation of the driverless vehicles before January 2015.

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The need for more energy could be slashed by making fossil-fuel burners such as automobile engines more efficient, speakers at a Houston conference said. Lawrence Burns, a former General Motors executive who is now director of the program on sustainable mobility at Columbia University, said 75 percent of the energy generated by cars is lost as heat and friction, and much of the remainder is used to move heavy components. One key to major change will involve harnessing emerging technologies, such as self-driving cars like those being developed by Google (above) and other companies, he said.

When self-driving cars are a reality for everyone, we may have Texas A&M to thank -- or blame -- for it.

On Monday, Texas A&M's System Board of Regents gave approval for the Texas A&M Transportation Institute to begin soliciting money from donors to fund a project that could make self-driving cars a reality.

Institute director Dennis Christiansen said his goal is for the Accelerate Texas Center at College Station to be the focal point in Texas for the development and testing of autonomous vehicle technology.

They won't be building the cars, just working with companies to perfect them.

“The next area of focus is to attract more public and private sector partners into the center," Christiansen said. "We will have more to share once the center is up and running."

Christiansen told the Eagle in College Station that he would like the center to become a hub for car companies to develop, test, and implement advancing car technology, like autonomous cars.

The center is still in its infancy, according to Rick Davenport, spokesman for TTI. The hope is that the center will also have a positive impact on the area as companies arrive to use the facility. It is not known which car companies are prospective users of the facility.

Google has already been working on autonomous cars for some time, and showing off their hard work. Theirs will take you out for tacos and get your dry cleaning. At last month's North American International Auto Show in Detroit Google's team continued to be a big topic as they had been in the past years.